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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25962385">You Fall in Flame</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/broken_ankle/pseuds/broken_ankle'>broken_ankle</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Cunning Title to Follow [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Supernatural</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gay Lucifer (Supernatural), Gen, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Supportive Michael (Supernatural)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 09:07:37</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,387</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25962385</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/broken_ankle/pseuds/broken_ankle</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After Lucifer is cast out, he expects Michael–prim and proper Michael, always following father's wishes–to keep his distance, to forget about him. What he doesn't expect is for Michael to move heaven and hell to get his brother back.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Lucifer &amp; Michael (Supernatural)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Cunning Title to Follow [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1907785</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>You Fall in Flame</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Yeah, I know the saying is "to move heaven and earth", but "to move heaven and hell" sounded better applied to these two. Is it wordplay? It's funny nonetheless.</p><p>I know nothing of anything, particularly how siblings interact in real life.</p><p>This fic deals with a character getting thrown out of his house by his father because he's gay. There is also an instance of the f-slur used by a (gay) character to describe how he thinks his brother sees him. Reader discretion is advised.</p><p>Please, tell me if you think I should add a tag or a warning. And if you want to leave a comment, feel free/encouraged to dos so.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lucifer stops dead in his tracks when he gets out of the shelter. He almost doesn't, the sight a familiar one, but it's not normal. Not here.</p><p>"Come to deal another round of righteous punishment?" he says, voice carefully sarcastic and snappish to filter his weaknesses out.</p><p>Michael uncrosses his arms. "Why would I do it?"</p><p>Lucifer snorts a bitter laugh. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe because you're the perfect little son who never goes against father? The perfect little soldier fighting his battles for him?" He can't mask the biting hurt in his words, and that makes him angrier. He thought he was over it. Father threw him out of the house, big deal. Michael didn't even bother to call him, big deal. He promised himself he doesn't care about what his big brother thinks.</p><p>Michael's face stays calm and pleasant, the same mask that'd always make him mad whenever they argued. "I do not fight his battles for him."</p><p>"Oh, come off of it, Michael! Father says jump, you ask how high. You've always done, even before mother died."</p><p>"Not this time."</p><p>Lucifer shakes his head. "Yeah, right." This conversation is over. He begins walking, not even picking a definite direction, just knowing that he needs to get away from here, away from Michael before the twine that's keeping his emotions at bay snaps. He hears steps following him, and he chokes on a laugh. Of course Michael won't leave him alone until he's thoroughly humiliated him. Of course he won't relent until Lucifer's just a raw mess of betrayed trust.</p><p>"Why will you not believe me?" Michael asks, and Lucifer's lips curve into a satisfied smirk at the twinge of annoyance in his voice.</p><p>"Don't know. Seventeen years of knowing you, I'd guess."</p><p>"When have I ever given you the impression I would want to get rid of you?"</p><p>"Every day," Lucifer says, not looking at him, but he knows it's not true even as he's saying it. True, Michael and he often argued, sometimes even violently enough to prompt Ariel to physically separate the both of them or, later, to make Gabriel burst into tears, but it's what they do. They argue, they fight, but at the end of the day they're each other's best friend.</p><p>Until father orders Michael to ignore him, that is.</p><p>A hand clamps down on his arm, and Lucifer is wheeled around to look into his brother's eyes, hurt and angry and sad. He shakes the touch off, but he can't ignore that look. Michael's always been good at masking his emotions, but he can't fake them.</p><p>"What happened?" Michael asks, and Lucifer is angry again.</p><p>"Like you don't know," he hisses. "I'm sure father has gloated about it enough for the whole state to know." He turns again, and this time there are no steps following him. He tries not to let it hurt.</p><p>This time it's words that stops him.</p><p>"The twins told me."</p><p>Lucifer looks back at his brother in surprise.</p><p>Michael isn't looking at him. "Well, Hannah told me. Anna was too furious to even look me in the eyes. They blame me. Gabriel does, too." When he raises his head, Lucifer isn't as shocked as he should be to see the glistening in his eyes. "I am sorry, Lucifer. I did not know. Nobody told me until I came home a month ago, and by then they all thought I would take father's side." His voice breaks, and the first tear falls. "I didn't know," he repeats.</p>
<hr/><p>Michael exhales a long sigh when he finally turns the engine off in the driveway. He takes a moment to breathe in the silence before a crowd of siblings descend on him.</p><p>Nobody appears to help him take his luggage inside, but he does not mind. He never has liked people going through his stuff.</p><p>"I am home!" he calls once he is inside. There is no sarcastic reply, no joke at his expenses, no prank to welcome him. The house is quiet, which worries him. When he came home for spring break, Lucifer and Anna were immediately on him, the rest of his siblings following. Now there is nobody waiting for him.</p><p>"I was beginning to think you had decided to stop for the night," a voice says from the kitchen.</p><p>Michael turns around. Ariel is sitting at the table with an actual book in front of her. There is an abandoned plate of what appears to be pasta not too far.</p><p>"Where is everyone?" he asks.</p><p>Ariel shrugs. "Around. The twins should be in their room, last I heard Gabriel and Balthazar were playing in the den, and Castiel is at Sam's house. Mr Winchester is bringing him back tomorrow after breakfast." She goes back to reading without another word.</p><p>Michael frowns. His sister left out an important part of the family. "Where is Lucifer?"</p><p>At that, Ariel snorts. "You know where he is," she says, her tone harsher than normal. She stands up, scrapes the last of her pasta in the bin and leaves the kitchen with what Michael can now see is a biology book.</p><p>"Ariel, where is Lucifer?" he shouts after her, but she ignores him. He is starting to get worried.</p><p>A flash of red comes running down the stairs, and he finds himself pushed back a couple of steps by a furious Anna.</p><p>"How could you?" she screams. "He's our brother!"</p><p>Michael lifts his hands in a placating gesture. "I do not know what you are talking about," he says, carefully. Anna's temper is infamous among those who know her.</p><p>"You know what I'm talking about!" She pushes him again, and he goes along with it. "How could you do that to your own brother?"</p><p>A feeling of dread coils into his stomach. Whatever Anna is talking about, it has to be about Lucifer. It <em>has to</em>. "Anna, what happened to Lucifer?"</p><p>Her expression turns even more furious, and she lifts an arm as if to strike him. A hand grabs her wrist before she can, however.</p><p>"Leave him," Hannah says to her twin. "Come on, let's go back upstairs. We still have to finish our homework."</p><p>For a moment, it looks like Anna is not going to desist, but then she huffs loudly and turns on her heels with a last venomous glare at Michael.</p><p>"Hanna, what—" he begins, but she cuts him off.</p><p>"Don't." She follows her twin out of the room and up the stairs without a glance backwards.</p><p>The coil of dread is now a boulder.</p>
<hr/><p>"You didn't know?"</p><p>Michael shakes his head. "No. When I saw you were not home, I asked, but nobody would tell me. Hannah did only because I cornered her the day after."</p><p>The image of Michael engaging in a battle of stubborness with Hannah is funny, Lucifer has to admit. That doesn't change the fact that he still doesn't know why his brother is here or what to do with it.</p><p>"How are the others?" is the only thing he can fathom to ask. He misses them.</p><p>A small smile finds its way onto Michael's lips. "They are well. They all miss you."</p><p>"Even Ariel?"</p><p>"Even Ariel."</p><p>Lucifer sinks his hands in his pockets. He looks up and down the sidewalk at the sea of people going to work and takes a decision. "Come on. You're buying me breakfast."</p><p>Michael follows with a shake of his head.</p>
<hr/><p>"So," Lucifer begins with his mouth full, "now what? You find me, you convince me to go to conversion camp? Because father seemed really set on never wanting to see me again. I doubt he'd pay for it." He won't make it easy for them, if that's what they want to do with him.</p><p>"How can you even possibly think I would do something like that to my own brother? To <em>you</em>?" Michael snaps, and Lucifer looks up at him in surprise. His brother really looks angry at mere thought. Why? Isn't that what father has always preached? Deviations must be corrected or smothered?</p><p>"How can you—" Michael breaks off with a deep inhale. His eyes close. When he reopens them, he's calmer than before, but that edge of righteous wrath is still lurking behind his irises. "Those places are horrible. There is no way <em>in hell</em> I would let father send you to one."</p><p>Now Lucifer is completely lost. He masks it under a sneer and another bite of his pancakes. "Thought Hell was what's waiting for fags like me."</p><p>"No."</p><p>"No?"</p><p>Michael stares at him, almost like he's trying to drill something into his head by sheer force of will. "No. You will not go to Hell for being yourself. If being yourself does not hurt anyone–and it <em>does not–</em>nobody can tell you it is a bad thing."</p><p>Lucifer smirks. "Are we talking about the same thing here? If you didn't get the memo, the Bible kind of condemns homosexuals."</p><p>Michael sets his jaw in a hard line. "I do not care about the Bible."</p><p>Lucifer forces himself not to appear shaken by his brother's words. "Sorry?"</p><p>Michael shoots him a glare. "You heard me. You hurt nobody being yourself."</p><p>"I'm gay, Michael!" Lucifer almost shouts. He's tired of this, tired of his brother pretending to be okay with something he obviously abhors. He just wants to be left alone with his pain.</p><p>"Does being gay makes you less you?"</p><p>He freezes for a moment, rewinds the conversation. "No," he tentatively answers after a few beats. Where is he going with this?</p><p>Michael shakes his head. "Then I do not care. Being gay is part of you, and I love you, Lucifer. You are my brother."</p><p>Lucifer isn't completely ashamed of saying that he bursts into tears.</p>
<hr/><p>Lucifer is trying not to cry as he makes his way through the park.</p><p>So father caught him making out with Will and threw him out. So what? He doesn't need him.</p><p>He doesn't need any of them.</p><p>He doesn't need Michael.</p><p>He doesn't doubt that Michael knows. Father always likes to gloat about his sanctimonious decisions. No, Michael has to know by now. It's stupid of him to hope that his big brother will swipe in and make everything better. Michael wouldn't make anything better, not about this, not if it means going against their father.</p><p>Better if Michael doesn't become involved.</p><p>He needs to stop thinking about Michael. It won't change anything.</p><p>He walks up to the bench under the old oak tree. This is where Michael used to make camp when he brought them to the park. He sits down, smiling at the particular memory of Gabriel and Balth trying to teach Cassie how to fly a kite. God, it seems like yesterday that his youngest brother was two and learning to talk, seated on Michael's knees while the twins rolled down the hill, Anna crashing into Ariel and laughing up at their sister's first attempts at her signature glare of death.</p><p>This is also where Lucifer first began to suspect he was gay, staring at a bare-chested older boy a little ways off, blushing and trying to avert his eyes only to find himself looking back every time.</p><p>Not all the memories of this bench are good. Lucifer doubts the one he's making will be.</p><p>The sun's almost set. Two hours still, maybe three, and then he can sneak back into the house to at least grab a change of clothes and his phone.</p><p>He doesn't know what he'll do after. Maybe he'll catch a bus to uncle Chuck's, ask if he can stay with him and aunt Becky. Maybe he'll go to Detroit. He's always wanted to visit Detroit.</p><p>For now, Lucifer closes his eyes and breathes.</p><p>He needs to stop hoping that Michael will find him and bring him home.</p><p>Michael's not coming.</p><p>He's on his own.</p>
<hr/><p>"What will you do now?" Michael asks. They're walking side-by-side, no longer pressed together by people hurrying to work.</p><p>Lucifer shrugs. "I guess I'll try to find a job."</p><p>"Come live with me."</p><p>He can't turn his head fast enough to boggle at his brother. "What?"</p><p>Michael's not looking at him, fixed as he is on his feet. "I am starting sophomore year at Kansas University in the fall. I already found an apartment near campus. It is big enough for two. Our siblings could come to visit with minimum problems."</p><p>"But what about Harvard? You got a scholarship, you—"</p><p>Michael shakes his head, a bitter smile on his lips. He's still not looking at him. "I never wanted to be a lawyer. I do not care for Harvard nor for the scholarship. I will find work as a barista, if I have to, but you are much more important than anything else."</p><p>Lucifer's mind is trying to reboot, but it keeps flashing warning signals. This can't be happening. Michael can't be talking of leaving <em>Harvard</em> for him. He can't be talking of going against—</p><p>"What about father?" he hears himself say. Michael would never go against father.</p><p>Michael sneers, and finally he lifts his head from the pavement. His eyes are shining with fury. "Who cares about father," he seethes. "He threw you out for being yourself, he doesn't deserve anything from us."</p><p>"Michael, think about it—"</p><p>"I am serious! I even reached out to aunt Naomi for help!"</p><p>It's this that cements it. Michael and aunt Naomi dislike each other with a passion. If he's really reached out to her, and if she's really agreed to help...</p><p>"Can I think about it?" he asks, his voice considerably smaller than he'd like.</p><p>Michael's smile is the most relieved he's ever seen.</p>
<hr/><p>Lucifer opens the door to find one of his siblings on the other side.</p><p>"Mikey! Come here!" he shouts as he lets their guest in. "We have a visitor!"</p><p>Michael looks up from his homework. His eyes widen slightly, and he immediately comes to join them. "Welcome. Sorry, I did not catch your name."</p><p>"Raphael," Raphael says. "Father threw me out too."</p><p>Lucifer can't stop a fit of laughter.</p><p>Michael looks like he's already planning a custody battle or six.</p><p>Raphael ends up sleeping on the couch for two weeks until they buy a third bed.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>The "Does being [insert queer identity here] make you less you" argument is actually something my mom said to me when I came out to her.</p><p>The title is from <em>Stars</em> from the musical <em>Les Misérables</em>. I find that song really funny if I listen to it after interacting with <em>Supernatural</em> in any way, shape or form.</p><p>Fun fact: the siblings' father (aka God if you will) isn't Chuck (because no) but a man naned Emmanuel (no, it has nothing to do with the name given to an amnesiac Cas. Emmanuel is, according to the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus' given name. Given that at least Catholics (I don't know about other Christians) generally agree on Jesus being the Son part of God and therefore the part that lived on Earth, I thought it was appropriate).</p></blockquote></div></div>
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